Historically, receivers coupled to a remote controlled vehicle simply receive remote control signals from a transmitter and output the remote control signals directly to one or more servos coupled to the remote controlled vehicle. More sophisticated receivers are able to filter the remote control signals, for example, in order to remove glitches that are typically caused by weak signal strength. Some of those receivers are also equipped with a type of fail-safe feature that typically generates default control signals for adjusting to a pre-selected motion and/or speed when some or all of the remote control signals are no longer intelligible. In general, however, most intelligent and complex operations involved in generating remote control signals for remote controlled vehicles are performed at transmitters.
Currently available transmitters for remote controlled vehicles range from very basic and inexpensive transmitters to very complex and expensive transmitters. Basic transmitters simply generate control inputs based on one or more control elements (e.g., dial knob, control stick), generate remote control signals containing the control inputs, and transmit the remote control signals to a receiver. More sophisticated transmitters typically have multiple vehicle (model) memories to store several sets of control input setup information for multiple vehicles. Users of the sophisticated transmitters, however, sometimes switch the transmitters to an incorrect vehicle (model) memory, thereby causing serious damage or even a total destruction of a remote controlled vehicle that they attempt to control. For instance, a user may crash a model helicopter if the user attempts to fly it using a transmitter that is incorrectly switched to a vehicle memory for a model speed boat. Users also often have difficulty programming the vehicle memories with different setup information through a typically small display area and/or keypad on the transmitters.